Q & A with kg

You might have noticed that I deleted The Skog Blog Schedule.  When it was first created it was a great way to help me get on track with my blog posts.  However, I got to the point where I would want to post something but it wouldn't fit in the day's schedule and so I would hold off, forget what I wanted to post and then it would be too late. It's a new year and I have decided to break free from the bonds of my schedule and get back to the free flowing early days of The Skog Blog.  Fear not, I will still try to have a Week in Review posted each Sunday night but gone are the daily music reviews.  That news will probably be cause for some rejoicing by many of you who had informed me that you were burned out from all of my music reviews.  There will still be plenty of music but it just won't be my primary focus.  I have a few new Skog Blog gimmicks that I plan to roll out in the near future.  First up, let's answer some reader questions in a new feature that I will call, Q&A with kg. Let's get to it.

So if your tagline has yerba mate, why doesn't your content? I demand a review of the top brands, as well as your favorite recipe for consumption ie:  "Best consumed with candy cane, good company, nag champa, listening to the Doors, while hiding out from strange roomates and an even stranger smell."
pomello?
coconut?
minty mint?
Amanda?
Cruz de Malta
Rosemante selection especial?

come on dude. (Brohammas)

A little bit of background before I answer this question from Brohammas.  He and I were roommates in college the first year after our missions.  One of our roommates had a pet snake that smelled like a mix of feces, urine, and hamster food.  Very pleasant.  Because of this, most of the time at our apartment was spent in our bedroom with the door shut, window open (even in December), burning Nag Champa incense and drinking mate while listening to The Doors or something of that ilk.  Brohammas became almost as big of a mate addict as myself and continues to drink to this day.  We were to yerbamate as Bubba Gump was to shrimp.  We drank it out of every fruit imaginable, we added candy and mints and used everything from water to milk to juice.

To answer the question - you are correct.  I have been a slacker.  The yerbamate coverage on The Skog Blog has been unacceptable.  To remedy this, each week I will offer up an idea or recipe to make your yerba drinking more enjoyable.  This week's advice - Mixing your yerba with Lipton Herbal Tea.  Buy yourself the sampler pack, tear open the teabag and dump it into your mate.  Soon enough you'll be drinking gourmet mate everyday.  The apple cinnamon is highly recommended.

You never posted any New Year's Resolutions, did you make any? (Wheels)

I did, Wheels, thanks for asking.  There is an epidemic that I feel threatens the safety of everyone who lives in a home with small children.  I decided that this year I was going to do something about it.  That problem?  The Skanky Rotten Sippy Cup.  Anybody with children has done the dishes and thought to themselves, "Hmmm, I could have sworn that there were more sippy cups around the house" but due to time constraints or apathy we just fire up the dishwasher and move on.  Perhaps on occasion we assume that our better half might have just unloaded the dishwasher and that is the reason for the strange lack of children's drinking equipment.  Then a few days later we start smelling things.  Things no man or woman should ever smell.  The scent is even worse than the aforementioned snake wiff from my previous post and it is wafting up from under our bed.  We start to fear there might be a rogue cup or a lost diaper and some quick Encyclopedia Brown work confirms our suspicions.  Other times you find a cup in the back of your vehicle and you say a silent prayer as you crack it open in hopes that it will just be water and not milk... I'm still not sure which is worse though - opening a skanky rotten sippy cup and dealing with the consequences of its contents or coming into a room and seeing one of your children taking a drag out of a cup that you haven't seen for so long that you just assumed it had been thrown away.  I have instituted a No Cup Left Behind policy in the Skog home.  I am so fired up about my anti-skanky rotten sippy cup agenda that I have created a counter to your left to show you how many days we have gone without an incident.  I would ask that you do the same.  "Not again in Twenty Ten!  Not again in Twenty Ten!"  Scream it with me!



The Saints won the Super Bowl and you had Drew Brees on your fantasy teams, right?  He was really good so your fantasy teams must have been awesome too.  How come you never wrote a blog about your Fantasy Football Championships this year? (Herms)

Long time readers know that I am a Fantasy Football Champion. I have won often enough that most of my friends just call me champ.  Well a funny thing happened this year, even though I felt as if I had one of the best teams 'on paper' I was unable to even get a playoff berth.  I blame myself for teasing the gods of Fantasy Football and posting my now infamous, "How to Draft a Champion FFL Playlist" last summer.  I was so furious when the season ended that I was ready to throw in the towel and retire from the world of FFL.  It was a horribly tough decision.  After much soul searching, I decided that I just can't stop playing and I will regroup and recover and be back next year with a vengeance.

What is the best song to which I am not currently listening? (All readers)

That song would be World News from the album Gorilla Manor by a band called Local Natives.  Checkout the entire album below.  A close second would be Who Knows, Who Cares from the same album.

Thanks for reading everyone. If you have any questions that need answers please post in the comments and I will take a crack at them next time.

The Skog Family Week in Review

The Rockstar Report



The Lil' Rockstar is coming up on her first birthday.  Over the holidays she came down with a case of walking (crawling) pneumonia and wouldn't eat.  Her weight kept plummeting and Wheels was getting very concerned.  Because of this we have upped her calorie intake and have given her the green light to eat anything - cheerios, socks, or whatever crumbs she can find on the floor.  She has surged to 17.25 lbs and has almost caught up to the first year weight of her big sisters.

The Razor Companies Lie to Us

For years I have been told that women love a man who is clean shaven.  I have also been told that if I have a clean shaved face I can speed skate, ride a motorcycle and slam dunk a basketball.  Well, they are liars.  You might remember my glorious beard from the previous post.  I decided that because of the dry winter I needed to give my face a fresh start and remove the crusty hair from my face.  The Lil' Rockstar did NOT approve of my decision.  Thanks a lot, Gillette, now my baby won't even let me look at her.





Fort Skog



Superstar's New Glasses



Skoggy Alive

For Christmas of 2008, Santa brought the Superstar a Baby Alive doll.  Talk about a racket.  Sure the baby can eat and drink and go the bathroom and little kids love it but all that means is that we have to buy the special 'Baby Alive Food' and 'Baby Alive Diapers', give me a break.  I decided to get in on the action.  Coming Christmas 2010 - Skoggy Alive.  So far we have programmed her to eat, drink, sleep, go potty and crawl.  Checkout the prototype below.  She is sure to be a hot seller so get in your orders early before you have to pay triple the price on eBay.  Now accepting orders at skoggyalive@theskogblog.com.



We Are (clap, clap) #1



Superstar and her cousins Millie and Madzy Padzy spent the past week attending Mini Cheer camp at the local high school.  The clips below are of the girls doing their cheers and dancing during the halftime show of the basketball game.  I realize that Madzy Padzy isn't actually my child but I'm pretty sure that Superstar and Toots think that she is in fact their older sister so I included her clip as well. Also, Madzy's mom, Jen, is so busy right now with school that she won't get around to posting about this until spring break so I figured I would help her out.  In a few more years we'll have Toots and the Rockstar joining Superstar and Millie mini cheering and soon enough Madzy will be able to remove the 'mini' from her title.  She is a talented gal.  Sidenote - We feared that the Rockstar would hate the noise of the crowd but like a true rockstar, she couldn't get enough of it.  I might have a new companion to take with me to the Jazz games.





Valentine's Day

The Skog Girls are definitely girly, girls and are big fans of Valentine's Day.  I swear they didn't lick the knives while frosting any of the cookies that we delivered to their friends (wink).



Superstar Pics of the Week

And of course, here is P's portfolio of the week.  Until next week...

Sundance TwentyTen

I am still speechless from The Super Bowl.  What a game!  What a finish!  Checkout the highlights below:



Alright, alright, I know what you're thinking.  "kg, that Super Bowl was from like 20 years ago" well this is my blog and I will review things in my own time.  This weekend I will be reviewing the new video game that is taking The Skog Home by storm.  Stay tuned.

In other news, last month I participated in what has become an annual tradition, The Sundance Film Festival.  Back in the day I always assumed it would be a major pain to head up to Park City and deal with two of my least favorite things - crowds and traffic.  Because of this I never attended Sundance and I created my own Film Festival called "Capdance".  Capdance was basically myself, Flanksteak, Vanwarmer and other assorted family members watching 4 movies on a Saturday in January at the local Megaplex Theatre.  It was such a part of my life that I even proposed to Wheels during Capdance 2002.  Fear not, I didn't put a message on the movie screen like some kind of quasi jumbotron, there was a hint of romance involved, but alas that is a story for another day...

This year's Sundance might have been the best yet.  Flanksteak, Vanwarmer and myself headed up to Park City on a frosty Saturday morn last month and went 2 for 2 on quality films.  Quick sidenote: many people think that just because a film is in Sundance that it is good.  Well, many are not.  I would say our previous track record is barely break even between good and awful flicks.  However, this year there would be no complaints.  We saw The Tillman Story, a fascinating documentary about the former NFL player turned Army Ranger who was killed by friendly fire.  After that screening we headed over to another film premiere and were treated to Cyrus, a dark comedy about a creepy 21 year old son who tries to sabotage his mother's new relationship.

When I tell people that I attended Sundance, most of them only want to know whether or not I saw any celebrities.  Well of course we do.  Many of the actors attend the screenings and do Q&A sessions following the films.  It is one of the most enjoyable aspects of the Sundance experience.  You do also run into some people on the street and that, my friends, is when the real magic happens.  For those of you who don't like to read and just want to see the pretty pictures, look no further.

Here is Flanksteak and myself awaiting the day's first shuttle.

Checkout the fine print above my head on the window if you can. I only meet one of the seat's requirements but I will allow you to guess which one.

We stepped off the shuttle at the Tillman screening and run smack into Danny McBride. Yes THE Danny McBride. I haven't seen Flanksteak this happy in a picture since his baby, Lemon, was born.

kg getting in on the hot and heavy Danny McBride action.  McBride was a very cool guy who rode the shuttles and rubbed elbows with us common folk.  A+  Funny story, ok maybe not hilarious per se, but I showed this picture to some coworkers and said, "Here is my brother and I with Danny McBride."  My coworkers thought that  Danny and I were brothers.  Suck on that, Flanksteak...  or don't, I suppose, because that means that people think YOU are a star, pal. 

Vanwarmer headed out for popcorn and other snacks but in reality I think he just wanted to catch a closer glimpse of Lisa Edelstein from House.

While sitting patiently waiting for the Tillman documentary to start mine eyes did see Bill Simmons enter the room. Bill is better known as The Sports Guy on ESPN.com and is my favorite writer of the past ten years.  Like an aggressive man racing for the hottest chick at a singles dance I quickly approached him and asked him for his number.  He declined but gave me a photo-op as a nice consolation prize.  He was a likeable guy who rather than mock my Duke sweatshirt (he is a well known Duke hater) complimented my beard. Class act.

Vanwarmer posing with infamous documentarian Michael Moore. When Vanwarmer asked him for a pic Mr. Moore asked Vanwarmer for $10. He was only joking, I think. IRregardless, Vanwarmer got the pic before the Tillman Story started and I overheard Moore as I was leaving say, "This film only scratches the surface. We need a more thorough investigation." I think that means he liked the movie as well.

Quite possibly the most important celebrity we saw was a man we lovingly call "The Town Crier". Anybody who has attended a screening at The Eccles Theatre in Park City knows who this guy is. He is the best in the business. He mixes sass with a no-nonsense attitude to ensure that no patrons end up on the wrong bus. He is a man truly worthy of a Bud Light Real Men of Genius Award. Here's to you, Town Crier.

A truly magical day that we hoped would never end. We finished the night with another tradition, a montage of photos that we call "Moon Over Sundance."



POSTLUDE:

Sadly, that day did end. However our Sundance experience continued on. Vanwarmer and Flanksteak saw a few more flicks over the next week and Wheels and I were able to catch one screening of The Audience Award winning happythankyoumoreplease with Corbie and her husband, Robert.  All in all I was 3 for 3 and truly had the best Sundance experience to date.